(Record of LinJi; T. Cleary translation)
There are a certain kind of blind shave-pates who eat their fill of food and then go to sit in meditation.
They grab hold of wayward thoughts and do not let them go on. Weary of noise, they seek quietude.
These are not Buddhist methods.
The ancestral teacher [Shenhui of Heze] said: "If you fixate your mind and contemplate stillness, hold up your mind for outer awareness and hold in your mind for inner realization, freeze your mind and enter stable concentration, this is all contrived activity."
[Your mind] is the person in you who is listening to the Dharma this way right now.
How can you try to cultivate this person or realize them or adorn them?
They are not [someone or something] that can be cultivated or adorned.
If we would have them adorned, in fact all things are what adorn them.
You people must not mistake what I say. [You will go wrong] if you seize upon the words in this old teacher’s mouth and think they are the real Path; or if you think you as people of ordinary mentality cannot presume to try to fathom or assess the inconceivable lessons of an enlightened teacher and experienced adept.
As soon as you adopt such an opinion, you have turned your back on this eye of enlightenment [within us all].
Then you are shivering cold and speechless like a baby donkey on a hill of ice.
I am not presuming to slander the enlightened teachers, lest I create mouth-karma.
Dear people, only the great enlightened teachers can presume to knock down the buddhas and patriarchs, judge the rights and wrongs of the world, repudiate and set aside the scriptural teachings, and rebuke and insult all you little ones.
They look for people amidst favorable and adverse currents.
I have looked for a fixed karmic identity constantly, but even the smallest particle of one cannot be found.
Like nervous new brides, would-be Zen people are afraid to be driven out of their homes, afraid that they will not be given food to eat, that they will be uneasy and unhappy.
Ever since ancient times, the former generations of enlightened people have been met everywhere by disbelief.
Only after they had been driven out did people begin to realize how precious they were.
But if people everywhere all were willing to accept them, what good would that do?
This is why [we say], "with one roar of the lion, the fox’s brain bursts."
Everywhere there are those who say that there is a Path that can be cultivated and a truth that can be realized.
You tell me: What path? What truth?
What is lacking in your present functioning?
Where will you cultivate and repair it?
The younger generation of would-be Zen people do not understand this, so they believe in these wild fox spirits. When they explain things, they tie people down.
They say that enlightenment can be attained only when truth and conduct are in accord and you guard yourself from misdeeds of thought, speech, and action.
This kind of talk is like springtime drizzle!
A man of old [Sikong Benjing, a disciple of the Sixth Patriarch] said: "When on the road you meet a person who has consummated the Path, above all do not face toward the Path."
Thus it is said that if a person cultivates the Path but does not travel the Path, then myriad kinds of false scenes and distorted perspectives soon arise all around.
When the sword of wisdom comes out, there’s not a single thing—the bright side doesn’t show but the dark side is illuminated.
Therefore, the ancients said, "Ordinary mind is the Path."
Worthy people, what are you looking for?
The independent person of the Path who is here before your eyes right now listening to the Dharma is clearly obvious.
It has never been lacking.
If you want to be no different from the buddhas and patriarchs, just see like this.
Don’t plunge into doubts and errors.
If you go from mind-moment to mind-moment without deviating [from this perception], you are called a buddha.
If your mind deviates, then reality-nature and form separate; if your mind does not deviate, then reality-nature and form are no different.
Submitted May 27, 2020 at 04:48AM by ZEROGR33N https://ift.tt/3graBR2
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